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Amber Augusta Rudd (born 1 August 1963) is a British politician serving as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions since 16 November 2018. A member of the Conservative Party, she served as Home Secretary from July 2016 to April 2018. Rudd was first elected Member of Parliament (MP) for Hastings and Rye in 2010. She identifies herself as a one-nation conservative, and has been associated with both economically liberal and socially liberal policies. Rudd was born in Marylebone and studied History at the University of Edinburgh School of History, Classics and Archaeology. She was first elected to the House of Commons for Hastings and Rye, in East Sussex in 2010 after defeating incumbent Labour MP Michael Foster. Rudd served in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change from 2015 to 2016 in the Cameron Government, where she spearheaded the need for renewable energy resources and climate change mitigation. She previously served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, deputising for Ed Davey at the Department for Energy and Climate Change from 2014 to 2015.

She was appointed Home Secretary in the May Government on 13 July 2016, and given the additional role of Minister for Women and Equalities in January 2018. Rudd was the third female Home Secretary, the fifth woman to hold one of the Great Offices of State and the fastest-rising politician to a Great Office of State since the Second World War. Rudd resigned as Home Secretary in April 2018 in connection with the Windrush deportation scandal.On 16 November 2018, Rudd was appointed Secretary of State for Work and Pensions by Prime Minister Theresa May, succeeding Esther McVey.

Charles Rodway Clarke (born 21 September 1950) is an English Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Norwich South from 1997 until 2010, and served as Home Secretary from December 2004 until May 2006.

David Blunkett, Baron Blunkett, (born 6 June 1947) is a former British politician, having represented the Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough constituency for 28 years through to 7 May 2015 when he stepped down at the general election. Blind since birth, and coming from a poor family in one of Sheffield's most deprived districts, he rose to become Education and Employment Secretary, Home Secretary and Work and Pensions Secretary in Tony Blair's Cabinet following Labour's victory in the 1997 general election.

After the 2001 general election he was promoted to Home Secretary, a position he held until 2004, when he resigned following publicity about his personal life. After the 2005 general election, he was appointed Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, though he resigned from that role later that year following media coverage relating to external business interests in the period when he did not hold a cabinet post. The Cabinet Secretary Gus O'Donnell exonerated him entirely from any wrongdoing in his letter of 25 November 2005.On 20 June 2014, Blunkett announced to his constituency party that he would be standing down from the House of Commons at the next general election in May 2015. The editor of The Spectator magazine, Fraser Nelson, commented, "He was never under-briefed, and never showed any sign of his disability ... he was one of Labour's very best MPs – and one of the very few people in parliament whose life I would describe as inspirational." Responding to a question from Blunkett on 11 March 2015, Prime Minister David Cameron said: "As a new backbencher, I will never forget coming to this place in 2001 and, in the light of the appalling terrorist attacks that had taken place across the world, seeing the strong leadership he gave on the importance of keeping our country safe. He is a remarkable politician, a remarkable man."In May 2015 he accepted a professorship in Politics in Practice at the University of Sheffield (in 2014 he was invited to be a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences), and in June 2015 he agreed to become Chairman of the Board of the University of Law. In addition to his other work with charities, he was also chairman of the David Ross Multi Academy Charitable Trust from June 2015 to January 2017. He is currently the President of the Association for Citizenship Teaching (ACT).

In August 2015 he was awarded a peerage in the dissolution honours lists. He was created Baron Blunkett, of Brightside and Hillsborough in the City of Sheffield on 28 September 2015.

Diane Julie Abbott (born 27 September 1953) is a British Labour Party politician who was appointed Shadow Home Secretary in October 2016. She was first elected as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Hackney North and Stoke Newington at the 1987 general election, when she became the first black woman to hold a seat in the House of Commons.

Born in Paddington, London, Abbott studied History at Newnham College, Cambridge University. She worked in the Civil Service and as a reporter for Thames Television and TV-am before becoming a press officer for the Greater London Council. Abbott was elected to Westminster City Council in 1982. She unsuccessfully stood in the 2010 Labour leadership election, and was later appointed as Shadow Minister for Public Health by Ed Miliband. She also unsuccessfully attempted to be the Labour candidate for the 2016 London mayoral election.

Abbott supported Jeremy Corbyn in his bid to become leader, and was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for International Development. After multiple resignations in the Shadow Cabinet, she was promoted to Shadow Health Secretary, and further promoted to Shadow Home Secretary after Andy Burnham left to contest the Manchester Mayoral election. Following a series of poor interviews in the run-up to the 2017 election, Abbott was temporarily replaced as Shadow Home Secretary by Lyn Brown. After the election, Abbott revealed that she suffered from type 2 diabetes, saying that it had affected her performance. With her condition back under control, she returned to her position.

Abbott is seen as being on the left of the Labour Party and has voted against the party on several occasions, voting against the Iraq War, the introduction of ID cards and the renewal of Britain's nuclear deterrent. She has appeared frequently in the media, featuring in Have I Got News for You, and other programmes.

The Home Office (HO) is a ministerial department of Her Majesty's Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for immigration, security and law and order. As such it is responsible for the police, fire and rescue services, visas and immigration and the Security Service (MI5). It is also in charge of government policy on security-related issues such as drugs, counter-terrorism and ID cards. It was formerly responsible for Her Majesty's Prison Service and the National Probation Service, but these have been transferred to the Ministry of Justice. The Cabinet minister responsible for the department is the Home Secretary.

The remit of the Home Office was substantially reduced in 2007 when, after Home Secretary John Reid had declared the Home Office "not fit for purpose", the Prime Minister Tony Blair separated a new Ministry of Justice from the reduced Home Office. Its culpability in the Windrush scandal involving the illegal deportation and harassment of legal British residents is an example of a more recent failure.

The Home Office continues to be known, especially in official papers and when referred to in Parliament, as the Home Department.

The Home Secretary (IAST: Gṛha Saciva) is the administrative head of the Ministry of Home Affairs. This post is held by senior IAS officer of the rank of Secretary to Government of India. The current Home Secretary is Rajiv Gauba.As a Secretary to Government of India, the Home Secretary ranks 23rd on Indian Order of Precedence.

Jacqueline Jill Smith (born 3 November 1962) is a British Labour politician. She was the Member of Parliament for Redditch from 1997 until 2010, the first female Home Secretary and the third woman to hold one of the Great Offices of State, after Margaret Thatcher (Prime Minister) and Margaret Beckett (Foreign Secretary).

Smith was one of the MPs investigated by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards over a variety of inappropriate expense claims. Smith was never prosecuted, and was asked to pay back less than average after investigation by Sir Thomas Legg; but she was found to have "clearly" broken the rules on expenses and ordered to apologise.She ceased to be Home Secretary in a Cabinet reshuffle on 5 June 2009, and then lost her seat as Member of Parliament for Redditch in the 2010 general election.

Leonard James Callaghan, Baron Callaghan of Cardiff, (; 27 March 1912 – 26 March 2005), often known as Jim Callaghan, was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1976 to 1980.

So far the only holder of all four of the Great Offices of State, Callaghan served as Chancellor of the Exchequer (1964–1967), Home Secretary (1967–1970) and Foreign Secretary (1974–1976) prior to his appointment as Prime Minister. As Prime Minister, he had some successes, but is mainly remembered for the "Winter of Discontent" of 1978–79. During a very cold winter, his battle with trade unions led to immense strikes that seriously inconvenienced the public, leading to his defeat in the polls by Conservative leader Margaret Thatcher. Callaghan was the last Prime Minister born before the First World War.

Upon entering the House of Commons in 1945, he was on the left wing of the party. Callaghan steadily moved towards the right, but maintained his reputation as "The Keeper of the Cloth Cap"—that is, he was seen as dedicated to maintaining close ties between the Labour Party and the trade unions. Callaghan's period as Chancellor of the Exchequer coincided with a turbulent period for the British economy, during which he had to wrestle with a balance of payments deficit and speculative attacks on the pound sterling (its exchange rate to other currencies was almost fixed by the Bretton Woods system). On 18 November 1967, the government devalued the pound sterling. Callaghan became Home Secretary. He sent the British Army to support the police in Northern Ireland, after a request from the Northern Ireland Government.

After Labour was defeated at the 1970 general election, Callaghan played a key role in the Shadow Cabinet. He became Foreign Secretary in 1974, taking responsibility for renegotiating the terms of the UK's membership of the European Communities, and supporting a "Yes" vote in the 1975 referendum to remain in the EC. When Prime Minister Harold Wilson resigned in 1976, Callaghan defeated five other candidates to be elected as his replacement. Labour had already lost its narrow majority in the House of Commons by the time he became Prime Minister, and further by-election defeats and defections forced Callaghan to deal with minor parties such as the Liberal Party, particularly in the "Lib–Lab pact" from 1977 to 1978. Industrial disputes and widespread strikes in the 1978 "Winter of Discontent" made Callaghan's government unpopular, and the defeat of the referendum on devolution for Scotland led to the successful passage of a motion of no confidence on 28 March 1979. This was followed by a defeat at the ensuing general election.

Callaghan remained Labour Party leader until November 1980, in order to reform the process by which the party elected its leader, before returning to the backbenches where he remained until he was made a life peer as Baron Callaghan of Cardiff. He went on to live longer than any other British prime minister—92 years and 364 days.

In England and Wales, life imprisonment is a sentence which lasts until the death of the prisoner, although in most cases the prisoner will be eligible for parole (officially termed "early release") after a fixed period set by the judge. This period is known as the "minimum term" (previously known as the "tariff"). In some exceptionally grave cases, however, a judge may order that a life sentence should mean life by making a "whole life order."

Murder has carried a mandatory life sentence in England and Wales since capital punishment was suspended in 1965. There is currently no "first degree" or "second degree" murder definition. However, there were two degrees of murder between 1957 and 1965, one carrying the death penalty and one life imprisonment.Life imprisonment is only applicable to defendants aged 21 or over. Those aged between 18 and 20 are sentenced to custody for life. Those aged under 18 are sentenced to detention during Her Majesty's pleasure for murder, or detention for life for other crimes where life imprisonment is the sentence for adults. However people under 21 may not be sentenced to a whole life order, and so must become eligible for parole.

In addition to the sentences mentioned above, until 2012 there were two other kinds of life sentence, imprisonment for public protection (for those over 18) and detention for public protection (for those under 18). These were for defendants whose crimes were not serious enough to merit a normal life sentence, but who were considered a danger to the public and so should not be released until the Parole Board had decided that they no longer represented a risk. These sentences were abolished by the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012, although a number of prisoners remain imprisoned under the former legislation.

Michael Howard, Baron Howard of Lympne, (born 7 July 1941) is a British politician who served as the Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition from November 2003 to December 2005. He previously held cabinet positions in the governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major, including Secretary of State for Employment, Secretary of State for the Environment and Home Secretary.

Howard was born in Swansea. He studied at Peterhouse, Cambridge, following which he joined the Young Conservatives. In 1964 he was called to the Bar and became a Queen's Counsel in 1982. He became a Member of Parliament (MP) in the 1983 General Election, representing the constituency of Folkestone and Hythe. This quickly led to promotion and Howard became Minister for Local Government in 1987. Under John Major, he served as Secretary of State for Employment (1990–1992), Secretary of State for the Environment (1992-1993) and Home Secretary (1993–1997).

Following the Conservative Party's defeat in the 1997 General Election, he unsuccessfully made a bid for the leadership of the Party, and subsequently held the posts of Shadow Foreign Secretary (1997–1999) and Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer (2001–2003). In November 2003, following the Conservative Party's vote of no confidence in Iain Duncan Smith, Howard was elected to the leadership unopposed.

In the 2005 General Election, the Conservatives gained 33 new seats in Westminster, including five from the Liberal Democrats, but this still gave them only 198 seats to Labour's 355. Following the election, Howard resigned as Leader and was succeeded by David Cameron. Howard did not contest his seat of Folkestone and Hythe in the 2010 General Election and entered the House of Lords as Baron Howard of Lympne. He has been supportive of the Eurosceptic pressure group Leave Means Leave.

A minister is a politician who heads a government department, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the "prime minister", "premier", "chief minister", "Chancellor" or other title.

In Commonwealth realm jurisdictions which use the Westminster system of government, ministers are usually required to be members of one of the houses of Parliament or legislature, and are usually from the political party that controls a majority in the lower house of the legislature. In other jurisdictions — such as Belgium, Mexico, Netherlands, Philippines — the holder of a cabinet-level post or other government official is not permitted to be a member of the legislature. Depending on the administrative arrangements in each jurisdiction, ministers are usually heads of a government department and members of the government's ministry, cabinet and perhaps of a committee of cabinet. Some ministers may be more senior than others, and some may hold the title "assistant minister" or "deputy minister". Some jurisdictions, with a large number of ministers, may designate ministers to be either in the inner or outer ministry or cabinet.

In some jurisdictions — such as Hong Kong, the Philippines, the United Kingdom, and the United States — holders of an equivalent cabinet-level post are called secretaries (e.g., the Home Secretary in the United Kingdom, Secretary of State in the United States). Some holders of a cabinet-level post may have another title, such as "Attorney-General" or "Postmaster-General".

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) or Home Ministry (IAST: Gṛha Maṃtralāyā) is a ministry of the Government of India. As the interior ministry of India, it is mainly responsible for the maintenance of internal security and domestic policy. The Home Ministry is headed by Union Minister of Home Affairs Rajnath Singh.

The Home Ministry is also the cadre controlling authority for the Indian Police Service (IPS), DANIPS and DANICS. Police-I Division of the ministry is the cadre controlling authority in respect of the Indian Police Service; whereas, the UT Division is the administrative division for DANIPS and DANICS and the All India Services officers posted and working in the Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram-Union Territories (AGMUT) cadre.

Narinder Nath Vohra (born 5 May 1936), popularly referred as N. N. Vohra, is a retired 1959 batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of Punjab cadre who was the 12th governor of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. He was the first civilian governor of Jammu and Kashmir in eighteen years after Jagmohan.

As an IAS officer, Vohra has also served as Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister of India, Home Secretary of India, Defence Secretary of India and Defence Production Secretary of India.

From February 2003 until he became the governor of the state, Vohra had been the Government of India's interlocutor in Jammu and Kashmir. He was awarded India's second highest civilian honour, the Padma Vibhushan, for his contributors to the field civil service, in 2007.

Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet, (5 February 1788 – 2 July 1850) was a British statesman and Conservative Party politician who served twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1834–35 and 1841–46) and twice as Home Secretary (1822–27 and 1828–30). He is regarded as the father of modern British policing and as one of the founders of the modern Conservative Party.

As the son of wealthy textile-manufacturer and politician he was the first prime minister from an industrial business background. He earned a double first in classics and mathematics from Christ Church, Oxford. He entered the House of Commons in 1809, where he became a rising star in the Conservative Party. Peel entered the Cabinet as Home Secretary (1822–1827), where he reformed and liberalised the criminal law and created the modern police force, leading to a new type of officer known in tribute to him as "bobbies" and "peelers". After a brief period out of office he returned as Home Secretary under his political mentor the Duke of Wellington (1828–1830), also serving as Leader of the House of Commons. Initially a supporter of continued legal discrimination against Catholics, Peel reversed himself and supported the repeal of the Test Act (1828) and the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829, claiming that "though emancipation was a great danger, civil strife was a greater danger".After being in the Opposition 1830-34, he become Prime Minister in November 1834. Peel issued the Tamworth Manifesto (December 1834), laying down the principles upon which the modern British Conservative Party is based. His first ministry was a minority government, dependent on Whig support and with Peel serving as his own Chancellor of the Exchequer. After only four months, his government collapsed and he served as Leader of the Opposition during the second government (1835–1841). Peel became Prime Minister again after the 1841 general election. His second government ruled for five years. He cut tariffs to stimulate trade, replacing the lost revenue with a 3% income tax. He played a central role in making free trade a reality and set up a modern banking system. His government's major legislation included the Mines and Collieries Act 1842, the Income Tax Act 1842, the Factories Act 1844 and the Railway Regulation Act 1844. Peel's government was weakened by anti-Catholic sentiment following the controversial Maynooth Grant of 1845. After the outbreak of the Great Irish Potato Famine, his decision to join with Whigs and Radicals to repeal the Corn Laws led to his resignation as Prime Minister in 1846. Peel remained an influential MP and leader of the Peelite faction until his death in 1850.

Peel often started from a traditional Tory position in opposition to a measure, then reversed his stance and became the leader in supporting liberal legislation. This happened with the Test Act, Catholic Emancipation, the Reform Act, income tax and, most notably, the repeal of the Corn Laws. Historian A.J.P. Taylor says: "Peel was in the first rank of 19th century statesmen. He carried Catholic Emancipation; he repealed the Corn Laws; he created the modern Conservative Party on the ruins of the old Toryism."

Sajid Javid (; born 5 December 1969) is a British politician and a former managing director at Deutsche Bank. A member of the Conservative Party, he was appointed Home Secretary in April 2018. He has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bromsgrove in Worcestershire since the general election of 2010.

Born in Rochdale, Lancashire, Javid studied Economics and Politics at the University of Exeter where he joined the Conservative Party. Working in banking, he rose quickly to become a managing director at Deutsche Bank. He was elected as the MP for Bromsgrove in 2010 and was promoted to Economic Secretary to the Treasury and later Financial Secretary to the Treasury.

He served in the Cabinet as Culture Secretary from 2014-15, Business Secretary and President of the Board of Trade from 2015-16 and Communities Secretary from 2016-18. He was appointed to his current role as Home Secretary in June 2018, following the resignation of Amber Rudd for misleading the Home Affairs Select Committee over targets for removal of illegal immigrants during the Windrush scandal. As Home Secretary, Javid took a more liberal approach to immigration than his predecessors, lifting the immigration cap for NHS doctors and nurses and softening the “hostile environment” policy.

In British politics, the Shadow Home Secretary is the person within the shadow cabinet who 'shadows' the Home Secretary; this effectively means scrutinising government policy on home affairs including policing, national security, the criminal justice system, the prison service, and matters of citizenship. If the opposition party is elected to government, the Shadow Home Secretary often becomes the new Home Secretary though this is not always the case. The office has been held by Labour MP Diane Abbott since 6 October 2016.

Theresa Mary May (; née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) is a British politician serving as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party since 2016. She served as Home Secretary from 2010 to 2016. May was first elected Member of Parliament (MP) for Maidenhead in 1997. Ideologically, she identifies herself as a one-nation conservative.May grew up in Oxfordshire and attended St Hugh's College, Oxford. She worked for the Bank of England, and from 1985 until 1997 at the Association for Payment Clearing Services, also serving as a councillor for Durnsford in Merton. After unsuccessful attempts to be elected to the House of Commons she was elected as the MP for Maidenhead in the 1997 general election. From 1999 to 2010, May held a number of roles in Shadow Cabinets. She was also Chairwoman of the Conservative Party from 2002 to 2003.

After the formation of a coalition government following the 2010 general election, May was appointed Home Secretary and Minister for Women and Equalities, giving up the latter role in 2012. Reappointed after the Conservative victory in the 2015 general election, she went on to become the longest-serving Home Secretary in over 60 years. During her tenure she pursued reform of the Police Federation, implemented a harder line on drugs policy including the banning of khat, oversaw the introduction of elected Police and Crime Commissioners, the deportation of Abu Qatada, the creation of the National Crime Agency and brought in additional restrictions on immigration.In July 2016, following the resignation of David Cameron, May was elected unopposed as Conservative Party Leader, becoming the second female Prime Minister after Margaret Thatcher. As Prime Minister, May began the process of withdrawing the UK from the European Union, triggering Article 50 in March 2017 then, the following month, announcing a snap general election in June, with the aim of strengthening her hand in Brexit negotiations. This resulted in a hung parliament, in which the number of Conservative seats fell from 330 to 317, despite the party winning their highest vote share since 1983, prompting her to broker a confidence and supply deal with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) to support a minority government.

In December 2018, Conservative MPs had submitted letters of no confidence in May, triggering a vote of no confidence in her leadership. Before the vote, May said that she would not lead her party in the next general election scheduled in 2022 under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. She won the motion. May carried out the Brexit negotiations with the European Union, adhering to the Chequers Agreement, which resulted in the Withdrawal Agreement between the UK and the EU. This agreement was defeated by Parliament on 15 January 2019 resulting in Opposition Leader Jeremy Corbyn tabling a motion of no confidence in her government. The following no confidence vote was defeated.

Yvette Cooper (born 20 March 1969) is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford since 2010, having served as the MP for Pontefract and Castleford since 1997.

She served in the Cabinet between 2008 and 2010 under Prime Minister Gordon Brown as Chief Secretary to the Treasury and then as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. After Labour lost the 2010 general election, Cooper was appointed as Shadow Foreign Secretary, then became Shadow Home Secretary in 2011.

On 13 May 2015, Cooper announced she would run to be Leader of the Labour Party in the leadership election following the resignation of Ed Miliband. Cooper came third with 17.0% of the vote in the first round. Cooper subsequently resigned as Shadow Home Secretary in September 2015. In October 2016, Cooper was elected chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee.

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